The present invention relates to laser diodes, and more particularly, to laser diode assemblies employing a multiplicity of laser diodes to provide a multiplicity of laser beam outputs.
Laser diodes are widely employed for numerous applications wherein low power laser beams can be utilized to effect switching, illumination, measurement and other functions. Until recently, such laser diodes have been limited to generation of a single output beam. Recently there have been proposed light emitting diode assemblies which contain p-n, p-n structures, as described by Copeland et al in p-n, p-n Optical Detectors and Light Emitting Diodes, IEEE Journal of Quantum Electronics, Volume QE-14, No. 11 (November 1978); by Deppe et al. in Bi-Stability In An Alas-GaAs-InGaAs Vertical Cavity Surface Emitting Laser, Applied Physics 58 (23) (June-1991) and Kosonocky et al. in Multilayer GaAs Injection Laser, IEEE Journal of Quantum Electronics, Vol. QE-4, No. 4 (April 1968).
It is an object of the present invention to provide a novel stacked laser diode assembly providing multiple laser beam outputs which is highly efficient.
It is also an object to provide such a diode assembly in which laser beams of different wavelengths are generated.
Another object is to provide such a laser diode assembly which may be fabricated readily and which may be tailored to include various features.
A further object is to provide such a diode assembly which includes switching.